Samsonite
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- For the silver mineral, see Samsonite (mineral).
| Samsonite Corporation | |
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| Type | Public |
| Founded | Denver, Colorado, USA (1910) |
| Headquarters |  Mansfield, Massachusetts, United States |
| Key people | Marcello Bottoli, President Richard H. Wiley, CFO Annick Desmecht CMO |
| Website | www.samsonite.com |
The Samsonite company makes luggage from large suitcases to small toiletries bags. It started in Colorado in 1910 by Jess Swayder, as the Shwayder Trunk Manufacturing Company. Shwayder named one of his initial cases "Samson," after the Biblical figure. The company name changed to Samsonite in 1966.
Samsonite moved its marketing and sales offices from 91 Main Street in Warren, Rhode Island, to Mansfield, Massachusetts, effective 1 September. Samsonite had offices in Warren for 26 years. The building was decorated with an inflatable gorilla three stories tall, which remained along with a Samsonite retail shop at the Main Street building.[1] The gorilla was the company mascot following a 1969 ad campaign.
In July 2007 finance investor CVC Capital Partners took over Samsonite for $1.7 bn.
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[edit] Iconic advertising campaign
In the early half of the 1900s Samsonite promoted its hard-shell luggage by emphasizing its durability with taglines such as "Strong Enough to Stand On." Samsonite is identified with a 1970's ad campaign that actually was for American Tourister, a brand which Samsonite did not acquire until 1993. Current ads use the gorilla motif and Jurassic Park dinosaurs: "American Tourister: Tough luggage for a tough world."[2]
In the American Tourister 1970 television ad, a gorilla pounds a bright red American Tourister case, throws it around a cage, jumps on it, and finally drags it out the back door. It lasted 15 years[3], and is cited as an example of "branding," even though the branding has elided in the public mind from American Tourister to Samsonite. The 1969 ad was by Roy Grace, who also made the Alka-Seltzer ad "Mama Mia! That's a spicy meatball!" campaign.[4] Ad Age names the gorilla ad one of the top one hundred ad campaigns of the twentieth century.[5] The gorilla campaign was reprised with three new ads between 1980-1983[3] and again with a gorilla-dinosaur-suitcase vignette capitalizing the 1993 film Jurassic Park, which combined costumes, CGI and animatronics[2]
[edit] Brands
- Samsonite
- American Tourister
- Trunk & Co.
- Lark
- Lacoste (bags and small leather goods)
- Samsonite by Starck
- Hedgren
[edit] Where Samsonite is sold
Circa 1910-1920, shunned by luggage specialty stores, the company used department stores to sell. The company survived the slowdown of luggage specialty stores (Bentleys and El Portal bankruptcies), the demise of the catalog showrooms (Service Merchandise, etc.) and new mass merchants (Wal-Mart and Target). Samsonite is distributed primarily through:
- Samsonite Factory Outlet (US Locations)
- Samsonite Black Label Stores US Stores (Boston,Ma; New York,NY; Short Hills,NJ; San Francisco,CA; Woodfield,IL; Dallas,TX; Cherry Creek,CO; Santa Clara,CA; Las Vegas, NV ; Paramus, NJ ; Stamford,CT)
- Samsonite Black Label Stores International ( Brussels, London(Slone St, Bond St, Harrods), Milan, Moscow, Paris, Singapore, Tokyo ETC)
- Samsonite Classic Stores (King of Prussia,PA ; Ann Arbor,MI ; Arlington,TX ; Tampa,FL ; Concord,CA ; Nashua,NH ; Paris, FR;Antwerp, Belgium ; Amsterdam, NL ; I Granai,Italy ; London, Liverpool, Manchester, Birmingham, UK ; Attica, Greece ; Dubai,UAE ;Mumbai, Chennai, Delhi, India ; Bangkok,Thailand; Tokyo, Japan; Busan, South Korea; Taipei,Taiwan ; Vivo city, Singapore)
- Department Stores like Macys in the USA, John Lewis Partnership in the UK and Harrods
[edit] References
<references/ Budapest
[edit] External links
- Official Samsonite Site
- Answer.Com Samsonite Company History extremely detailed; accessed 2 January, 2007.
- Screenshot of 1969 gorilla commercial
- Full clip of 1999 gorilla & dinosaur campaign
- Interview with Marcello Bottoli regarding the future direction of Samsonite, CNBC European Business (March, 2008 by boyd Farrow)
